The Polished Bookworms: Big Little Lies

I joined a book club! I've been reading a ton lately so I jumped at the chance to join The Polished Bookworms group on Facebook. Each month we vote on a book to read and then later in the month discuss it and post a manicure based on what we've read. The book for January was Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty.

I was inspired by the scene where Madeline runs into Bonnie (her ex-husband's new wife) while out Christmas shopping.  

Bonnie had arranged for the whole family to volunteer at a homeless shelter on Christmas morning. "I just hate all that crass commercialism of Christmas, don't you?" she'd told Madeline last week, when they'd run into each other in the shops. Madeline had been doing Christmas shopping and her wrists were looped with dozens of plastic shopping bags. Fred and Chloe were both eating lollipops, their lips a garish red. Meanwhile Bonnie was carrying a tiny bonsai tree in a pot, and Skye was walking along next to her eating a pear. ("A fucking pear," Madeline had told Celeste later. For some reason she couldn't get over the pear.)

I couldn't get over the pear either! I painted two red lollipops for Madeline's children and a bonsai tree and pear for Bonnie and her daughter Skye. 

I couldn't be happier with the way the lollipops came out. The sticks really complete the look! I started with a coat of Hit the Brakes from Spoiled. It's a red jelly that was perfect for the shiny red candy. I used white and brown polish to paint in the detail of the sticks and the round center of the lollipop then gave it another coat of Hit the Brakes to create a pond manicure effect with the details encased in the "candy." I rolled up bits of paper and stuck them to the under side of my nail to complete it.

For the bonsai tree I started with a sponged grey and white gradient- Sinful Colors, Snow Me White and Sally Hansen Complete Salon Manicure in Ion. The tree trunk is Spoiled, Pumping Gas and the leaves are a combination of Sally Hansen Hard as Nails, Limestone; China Glaze, Holly-Day and China Glaze, Don't Get Derailed.

The base for the pear is also SH Limestone. I sponged patches of Spoiled, Did I Dye It Too Blonde? which doesn't show too much, but possibly adds to the mottled texture of the pear skin. I used Spoiled, Pumping Gas for the dots and stem.

I'm not a very picky reader. I'll pick up anything as long as it's interesting. I wouldn't have thought to choose this book myself, but it was both entertaining and serious at the same time, touching on topics of domestic abuse and the difficulties of relationships in general. 

Right now I'm averaging around 3-4 books per month, so I'm going to run out of things on my reading list soon. What's your favorite book? Tell me what I should read next. :)

Here's what everyone else in the group is up to:

An InLinkz Link-up

I Love Triangle(s)

I've been craving some new stamping plates and Bundle Monster had a pretty good sale around Christmas time (15% off I think) so I bought two sets. I don't remember the official names, but I got the 400 and 600 series. They have a pretty good variety between the two so hopefully these will keep me entertained for a while. I've been trying really hard not to cave in and buy the very expensive MoYou London plates.

I love the tribal designs in these latest sets of BM plates. Both sets had a few options to choose from. The stamp I picked for this manicure is actually stacked triangles, but since the corners got cut off it's a little hard to tell. I'm looking at them now and wishing I had put the tip of the bottom triangle at the tip of my nail instead of the way it ended up.

 Good news! I think I may have found my perfect nude polish. This is French Pink by Nina Ultra Pro. My skin tone is very pink-based so this is a great match. The polish is a crelly with pretty darn good coverage. I put on three coats to make extra sure the nail line was covered, but I was impressed that it looked solid in two coats. I stamped with Bundle Monster plate BM-403 and Mundo de Unas black stamping polish. As mentioned above the cuticle tattoo is also from Bundle Monster. One sheet has 20 tattoos on it for $1.50. I've been wanting to try these out so I was happy to pick them up pretty cheap. Sadly, the tattoo didn't last very long. Hand washing definitely takes a toll quickly. I'd say these are best used for a special occasion/event because it started rubbing off after just a few hours. If they had been more expensive I'd be disappointed, but they're cheap enough it was ok.

What do you think of the cuticle tattoo trend? I was a little hesitant at first, but I kind of love them now.

China Glaze- Release (Giver Collection)

I've got a quick swatch for you today. This is Release from the Giver collection by China Glaze. I haven't seen the movie yet, but I've read all four books in the series. Based on some of the reviews of the movie I think I might try not to spoil things too much by watching a movie that will just make me angry... like the Divergent movies. I mean.. did they even read the books when they wrote that screenplay? 

I will tell you, I thought the Giver was the weakest book in the series (even though it was still pretty good). The next three books each build on the original story in a unique way. When it all comes together in the last book it's almost magical. I could be wrong about the movie though. If you've seen it would you recommend it?

I've got on two coats of Release. It has a nice formula- good opaque coverage without dragging. This purple shade is similar to a few others in my collection. The smoky grey tint is what makes this one a little different. With purple and grey being two of my favorite colors of course I love this one.

I wasn't really impressed with the giver collection as a whole, but I'm finding I like the colors individually much better. Some of them don't seem to "go" with the others, but on their own the colors are interesting and just different enough from others I own to make them worth buying. I ended up with only three out of the twelve shades, but I'm happy with the ones I got. What did you think of this collection? Do you have a favorite polish from it?

Orly Explosion of Fun

Ugh. I'm so disappointed in this polish and I wanted so much to like it. This is from the Holiday 2014 Sparkle collection. Its sisters are Bling and Mirrorball which are two outstanding polishes that I absolutely loved. In the bottle this polish lives up to its name- Explosion of Fun. On the nail.... eeehhhhh. Had I used some kind of base color I'm sure I would have liked it so much more. After my experience with Bling (two coats) and Mirrorball (three coats for effect, but two was really fine) I was expecting a similar experience. After four coats I finally conceded that it wasn't going to be happening.

The polish looked so dense and colorful in the bottle, I wasn't expecting to find that the larger fuchsia glitters were suspended in a clear base tinted with pinkish-purple shimmer. As you can see plenty of bare nail is still visible four coats later. The next time I wear this I'm going to use a base similar in color to the bigger glitters to give it a brighter effect.

This is a definite case of expectations not matching reality. I'm open to giving this polish another chance though. What's been your biggest polish letdown?

Influenster Dry Spray VoxBox and Water Marble Nails

Today I have a review for Influenster. If you're not familiar with Influenster it's an organization that uses word of mouth and social media to get honest reviews and advertising for a variety of products. After you sign up you fill out some quizzes and post reviews for products you've used and if you're lucky you'll get selected to receive a VoxBox. I've gotten to try a few things for Influenster now. The first time was actually nail polish, but it's gotten increasingly weirder from there. There was that one time with the cheese and that other time with the other cheese. This time I've gotten some antiperspirant to review for the Dry Spray VoxBox. Now, you may be asking how I plan to relate this to nails. Don't worry, I've found a way... sort of. You may have guessed from the picture above it has to do with water marbling. My idea was to spray the antiperspirant into the marbled polish like you would with hand sanitizer or hair spray for the water spotted technique.

It was a good idea in theory. 

What actually happened was after carefully dropping the polish into the water and creating a lovely marble I grabbed my can of Degree Dry Spray and went to lightly mist the surface of the polish with the spray. The antiperspirant shot out of the can at hurricane speed sloshing out a good amount of water and pushing all the polish against the side of the cup. So... no, not a great idea.

I went with a traditional water marble after my spotting fail which matches the swirls on the can nicely.

For the nails I used three coats of Sinful Colors, Cinderella as my base. This pale blue creme has a soft pink shimmer and goes on very sheer so I had to use three coats to get full coverage. It's a perfect match for the Degree can though. The silver is Spoiled, Daddy's Credit Card, yellow is Sally Hansen Insta-Dri in Expres-so Yellow and the orange is a nameless and apparently brandless creme I picked up somewhere. In case you wondering the pinkie is my favorite marble. I'm not good enough at this yet that I can recreate the same pattern on each nail. Maybe someday..

Ok, now on to the antiperspirant! Unilever has come out with a whole new line of these sprays available at Walmart. I've even seen some commercials for them on TV recently. There are Dove and Axe varieties in addition to Degree for both men and women. The one I got seems to be unisex. According to the card I received in the box I'm supposed to be wearing a white tank top and smiling as I spray. I figured standing in my bathroom in my bra looking slightly perturbed was close enough. I'm always a little hesitant to spray something for the first time. My aim isn't that good and I might accidentally spray myself in the eyes. In the end everything came out ok. I applied it to the appropriate under arm areas and I was on my way. It really did feel dry pretty quickly and seemed to work well all day.

Lets talk about the marketing for this product. The big draw seems to be that it dries instantly. I'd say that claim holds up pretty well, but drying time hasn't been a big concern for me since my current antiperspirant dries quickly enough. I was mostly interested in the can because it seems more portable. Every time I travel with my gel stick it gets turned upside down in my bag and the gel starts to come out all over the inside of the lid. If this spray could solve that problem for me that's something I'd be interested in. Unfortunately it will never have the privilege of accompanying me on a trip.

 I hate the aesthetics of this can and find it to be visually hideous! They've used yellow, orange and blue which are all my least favorite colors. Not a big deal really. I'm not going to spend all day staring at the can and you can bet I'm taking these nails off as soon as I'm done with my review, but it wouldn't make me avoid the product if I thought it was fantastic. 

The biggest problem (and really the only one to be fair) is the scent. When I shop for antiperspirant there are only two criteria a product has to meet. It has to work well (aka keep me dry) and it has to smell ok. Which in my case usually means as much like nothing as possible. I'm incredibly sensitive to smells and "Fresh Energy" in a deal breaker. The scent is a typical deodorant smell and I don't like it at all. They say scents can be very strongly related to memories and this one definitely is for me. It takes me right back to college and I guy I dated for a while. I stopped seeing him at least 50% because he smelled like this antiperspirant and I couldn't stand it. It wouldn't have worked out for many other reasons, but this one certainly hastened the end. 

All day long I could smell myself and it was a serious turn off. I had a fairly strenuous day at work and I think it did keep me from sweating but every time I'd get warm the smell would waft up and I couldn't wait to get home and scrub it off.

Degree DrySpray Antiperspirant- now with 10% more suggestively phallic diagrams.

With all that being said I think the product works well enough and other people probably wouldn't have my strong aversion to the scent. I'd be curious to see how the Dove version works and smells. If the scent was good I think I could get on board. What do you think? Is this something you'd try?

Blingy Geometric Stamping

Bling is back again with the addition of some stamping. My last post featured Orly's Bling (this beautiful gold holo base) on its own, but you know I couldn't leave it at that. I had a few days off around the holidays and all I wanted to do was paint my nails. And sleep in. And eat wayyyy too much candy and cookies. I got a lot of new polish to try, but Bling was too beautiful to take off after only a day so I added some stamping. The results are very art deco. It reminds me of all the Great Gatsby inspired manicures people were doing around the time the new movie came out. Coincidentally I watched the movie for the first time during my vacation. I thought it was pretty good. I'm sure it helps I haven't read the book since high school. If you saw the movie, what did you think?

I stamped with Mundo de Unas black stamping polish and Bundle Monster plate BM-322 over three coats of Orly, Bling.

Orly- Bling

Orly's Mirrorball has been wildly popular, but there's another polish from their Sparkle holiday collection that's been highly under-appreciated. Bling is a beautifully rich gold holo glitter which is the perfect complement to Mirrorball's silver holo. I was never much a fan of gold jewelry or accents for years but the nail world has changed all of that. There's something so warm and pleasant about gold nail polish that I've changed my mind about the metal in general.

Macro-licious

I found that two coats gave decent coverage, but I added a third for extra opacity. I was really impressed by the formula and how easy it was to get clean lines around the cuticles. You could also wear a single coat over a base color to add some golden holo goodness to any polish. Below I've taken photos in a variety of lighting to show how this polish looks in different settings.

Diffused lighting- taken inside my light box.

Direct indoor lighting- this one was taken under a lamp.

Direct sunlight- Wow.. this really sparkles outside.

Which polish do you like better? The silver Mirrorball or golden Bling?

Birefringence With A Twist

It's taken me a while to jump on the indie bandwagon, but I can see why people are totally addicted! I've been dragging my feet because of the higher cost per bottle and shipping associated with buying indies, but damn, there are some extra special shinies I've been missing out on. This is Birefringence from ILNP. I had no idea what birefriengence even meant before I got this polish. Turns out it's "the optical property of a material having a refractive index that depends on the polarization and propagation direction of light" according to wikipedia. That's a pretty fancy way to explain why multichromes appear to be two different colors at once. I love how painting my nails occasionally makes me smarter.

Birefringence is a beautiful indigo to violet multichrome. The pictures below are taken at different angles to show the color shift.

Are you curious yet what the twist is? I painted the under side of my nails neon yellow for a fun surprise. The yellow polish is by Kelly and doesn't have a name. I love the contrast between the purple on top and the bright yellow underneath. This might just be one of my top 10 favorite manicures of all time.

 How do you feel about this trend of painting the under side of the nail? It's a total pain to do, but I love the way it looks.

ILNP- Mutagen Swatches

I've had these swatches of I Love Nail Polish's Mutagen in my archives for a while and haven't posted them for a few reasons. As much as this polish is beautiful, it's equally hard to photograph. It's been swatched many times by ladies much more talented than me and I'm not bringing anything new or earth shattering to the table. I also took so many photos it was hard to choose which ones to post. In the end I narrowed it down to these. They might not be the best pictures ever taken but they're not half bad and they're mine. I love this polish and I had a ton of fun playing around trying to capture all the shifts. 

I've taken photos in a bunch of different lighting so you can see how the polish looks in different settings. I've got on three coats with no base color, although I've read a black base can make multichromes pop more. The pictures above were taken in a light box with diffused lighting. You can see the colors shift from green to a bluish purple at the edges.

The next pictures were taken outside. The one above is direct sunlight. It has crazy green metallic shine like a green beetle. Below is indirect sunlight. At some angles you get a soft peachy reflection. This is the shift that was most easily observable to me in person. In low light I often saw a pink glow almost hovering over the surface of the green polish.

I've also read that photographing a multichrome underwater helps bring out all the colors of the shift at once. My aquarium has a great light and lots of fish.. and water. The fish are always very happy to see me since it means they'll get fed soon. They were excited to participate in my photo session. This seemed like a good idea, but it was really hard to keep the angle of the light from reflecting too much off the surface of the water and get a good clear picture of the nails at the same time. The first picture has great shift but blurry fishies. The second picture has awesome fish, but the polish looks plain. I love the swirly colors of the fish tails. I Just wish I could have gotten these two things combined into one picture. 

After the aquarium experiment I moved on to a bowl of water inside my light box. I was able to capture some great pictures of the shift, but the pictures are soft and blurry due to the reflections on the surface of the water. I would love to know how other people get such crisp, bright underwater pictures. Waterproof camera? You can see below that Mutagen shifts from a vibrant green to blue and fuchsia back to a golden yellow-green.

Mutagen is one of my first multichrome polishes. I bought a few more from ILNP at the same time and so far I've been thoroughly impressed. They really do live up to the hype. I sat around at my desk all day wiggling my fingers back and forth to catch all the different colors.

What do you think of this one? Worth the hype or overrated?

MMXV- Happy New Year

 Happy New Years! Late as usual. It's still the 1st in every US time zone though! This year I won't be making any resolutions about being "on time" with my blogging schedule, that's for sure. I had really good intentions of getting this post up early, but then video games happened. In fact, video games even trumped the delicious breakfast I had planned to make. Sometimes these things get out of hand. Every time I blow off one hobby for another I can't help but think of Cartman.

I wanted to do something a little different for my 2015 New Year's manicure so I painted Roman numerals instead of the regular numbers. I'm loving it with the shattered glass stamp and glitter nails. Annnnd I'm getting way ahead of myself. 

Hey look, it's Orly's Mirrorball. Everyone has been going crazy for this polish. It's a silver holo with a very subtle scattered holo effect. What makes this one special is the slightly larger holo glitter particles that catch the light even more than the holo base. I found it at Sally's on clearance which meant I had no choice but to bring it home with me. I wanted to go all out with this mirrored look so I added some accent nails. I used a toothpick dipped in candle wax to pick up and place individual holo glitters from Born Pretty. It takes a while, but it's worth it. I feel like my fingers are tiny disco balls. 

Another plus for Mirrorball- it wears great. I'm off work this week so I've been a little easier on my hands than usual, but no tip wear and I've had this on since Monday. I added the stamping and numerals today and the original manicure still looked perfect. I stamped with Mundo de Unas black polish and Bundle Monster plate BM-208.

I went out shopping on Tuesday (Christmas money.. weeeee) and found a Mirrorball dress!! Yes, I tried it on, and yes, there is a very rare and elusive selfie of me wearing it below. No, I didn't buy it. It was a size too big and just a little too flashy for my boring lifestyle. At least my nails will always be crazy even if my wardrobe isn't.

Yay! Happy 2015 everyone! I can't remember being this excited about a new year in a really long time. I hope this year turns out amazing for all of us!